Part One

Robert Drake shot up so quickly he nearly fell off
the narrow cot. Squinting against the glare of the rising sun, the
young pilot jumped awkwardly to his feet and snapped a smart
salute.

"Captain Logan, sir," the flustered
seventeen-year-old said, his eyes starting to water as he struggled
to bring the shorter officer's backlit silhouette into clearer
focus. "I—I'm so sorry sir. I don't know how I could have
overslept…"

"At ease, kid." The gruff Canadian
grunted, the glowing tip of his cigar seeming to brighten as he
stepped out of the sun. "You didn't miss our appointment. And you
didn't oversleep neither."

The rising sun lent the sky a
rich orange glow, bathing the airstrip in golden light. Drake jogged
past the gleaming aerodrome to where Captain Logan was running a
final check on his machine, breathless and eager to find out why he'd
been called out of bed so early.

Finished with his check, the
captain tossed his notepad to a yawning mechanic and climbed up into
the cockpit.

Logan flew a Morane Parasol, a two-seater
monoplane of French design with an eighty horsepower Le Rône
rotary engine. Its wing was situated well above the body of the
aircraft, which made it extremely useful when taking reconnaissance
photographs of enemy positions.

Yet, despite its advantages and
general reliability, the Morane had a reputation among pilots as a
death trap. It had to be consciously flown every second: if the pilot
ever let go of the stick even for a moment, instead of simply
leveling out, the aeroplane would fall at once into a nosedive. To
control a Morane required constant vigilance and a careful
hand, and the fact that Logan had managed to build up such an
impressive record of success behind its controls was a testament to
his enormous courage and skill. Drake couldn't keep himself from
grinning.

"Fantastic!" he exclaimed, and rushed over to rest an
awed hand against the side of the captain's famous kite. "Don't
tell me you're honestly planning to take me up in your Morane,
sir!"

"Quit your slobberin' and climb in." The captain
grimly chomped on the cigar lodged between his teeth. "Old
man Xavier's got a mission for us. You're to be my observer this
mornin'."

Drake nearly passed out right there. Him, Captain Logan's observer? Sitting behind the greatest ace in the Royal
Flying Corps? Pointing out enemy troop locations, warning the captain of approaching German aeroplanes? It was too incredible to be true. But
from the way the rugged Canadian was glaring at him, it had to
be.

"What are you waiting for, Christmas?" the captain growled. "Get up here!"

"Yessir!" Drake squeaked,
clambering into place and banging his knee hard against the curved
back of the pilot's chair in the process. But the pain was nothing
next to his elation.

"If I may ask, sir," the teenager
called out as the captain began to taxi down the strip. "Where
exactly are we going?"

"I'll tell you when we're in
the air," the captain shouted back. "Now
shut-up."

The
Morane buzzed through the air some 5,000 feet above the ground. Drake
peered down over the side, reflecting how strange it was to be able
to look down without a wing getting in the way of the view. The
seventeen-year-old had been with the RFC now for almost a year, but
no matter how many times he rose up past the clouds, he would never
cease to be amazed at how tiny everything looked on the ground below.The entire battlefield sprawled before him, like a giant
brown, black, and greenish canvas that stretched on forever. He could
see both sets of trenches—those of the allies and the
enemy—parallel gouges in the earth separated by the barren,
cratered waste of No Man's Land. Beyond the front lines ran a
complicated network of communications trenches, then came the
second-line trenches followed by more communications trenches, and
finally the third-line trenches. It was a strange, surreal
sight, horrific and fascinating at the same time. All the contours,
hills, and valleys that were of such strategic significance on the
ground lost all meaning in the air. It really made him
wonder…"Hey, kid." Logan's gruff voice broke into his
wandering thoughts. "You're awful quiet back there.""What?
Oh, sorry sir," Drake said quickly. "I was just thinking."

Logan
nodded. "Flying kinda has a way of putting things in perspective,"
he said. "But that's no excuse for lettin' your mind wander. I
need you sharp and focused, especially considerin' where we're
headed."

"Where are we headed, sir?" Drake asked. "You
still haven't told me."

"Haig's getting ready to
launch a new offensive," the captain told him, referring to Sir
Douglas Haig, the Commander-in-Chief of the British Expeditionary
Force fighting in France. The Royal Flying Corps was attached to that
service, its main function being to act as the eyes of the infantry.
"It's up to us to scope out and photograph the enemy position.
We'll be flying over the German lines today, kid."

"Fantastic!"
Drake exclaimed, his pulse quickening at the very thought. "I can't
believe it—after all these months of training, a real mission at
last!"

Logan snorted, turning his head just far
enough to shoot the teenager a look from the corner of his eye. "Old
man Xavier's been keeping this part quiet," he said. "Didn't
want to start a panic among the ranks…"

"A panic?"
Drake frowned. "What are you talking about?"

"Der
Nachtflieger, that's what I'm talking about," the captain said
grimly. "Though you prolly know him better as the Midnight Aviator.
He's out there, waiting just behind the lines. And we're about to
fly straight into his turf."

Drake stared, truly stunned by
the captain's words. The Midnight Aviator was the stuff of legend
among the British fliers. Together, he and his striking black and red
Fokker aeroplane were the menace of the RFC. The prospect of actually
facing him in the air was overwhelming. Drake swallowed.

"Sir,"
he said, forcing his suddenly shaky voice back to its usual register.
"You've faced the Midnight Aviator before. What can you tell me
about him?"

"He's the greatest ace the Germans have,"
Logan said. "Even the Red Baron had to acknowledge it after the Aviator
managed to make a perfect landing in the dead of night with no lights
to guide him. Dumb luck, if you ask me, but that stunt's what
earned him his name. Other than that, hardly anything is known about
him. Not even his real name. Just a lot of hearsay."

"Is
it true that no one's ever seen his face?" Drake asked. "That's
what I've heard the others saying. They say he always wears a long
coat with a deep hood, and that he never takes off his
gloves."

"That might be true," the captain acknowledged.
"I was there the one time we managed to bring him down. His kite
was a blazing inferno. We all expected he'd been killed. But when
we got to the site, the Aviator was nowhere to be found. I could buy
he was left with some pretty disfiguring burns."

"Maybe,"
Drake said, not quite convinced. "But what about the other stories?
They say he can vanish in a puff of smoke, like the Devil himself!
And Madrox told me the Aviator can outmaneuver shells and bullets
with such uncanny precision, it's as though he can sense where
they're going to strike ahead of time!"

"Let's not get
carried away now," Logan cautioned. "It's probably Jerry
spreading most of that rot anyway, tryin' to build up the mythos.
The Aviator's a man, just like you and me. Don't forget
that."

"Yes, sir," Drake said, but though that
ended the conversation, it didn't stop the teenager's imagination
as he rode along in the back of the aeroplane. What was the Midnight
Aviator really like? And even more pressing--would he, Robert Drake,
have the courage to stand up to him if they should meet in the skies?

It was
still early when they reached the German lines. Drake could see very
little troop movement among the trenches, and the skies were
completely clear.

"All right, let's get this done quick,"
Logan called back, his hand already on the camera's ring.

The
camera was a large, square box the color of mahogany that was clamped
to the outside of the fuselage just beside the pilot. The pilot
looked through a ball and cross-wire finder to sight the picture,
then pulled a ring at the end of a cord to make an exposure. To
change the plates, he had to stretch his arm out into winds of up to
seventy miles per hour and push the camera's handle back and forth,
flying all the while with his left hand. It was a tricky procedure,
but Captain Logan was an expert in the as-yet primitive art of aerial
photography.

One of the massive disadvantages of
photographing the battleground from the air was
having to fly straight for extended periods of time. For a long
while, Logan and Drake proceeded with their mission unmolested, but
all too soon Drake spotted a small puff of gray smoke just below
them.

"Archie!" he cried. "They've got us in their
sights!"

"It's all right," Logan called back,
apparently unconcerned and more than preoccupied with operating the
camera. "They don't have the range yet. We've got some
time."

"Um…sir…no we don't," Drake responded in a
choked voice. "Look to the left. Aren't those—"

"Damn!"
Logan snarled, abandoning the camera and turning his full attention
to the Morane's controls.

"They're Fokkers, sir. Five
of them."

"Grab the gun, kid, and hang on tight," the captain shouted. "You're in for some fancy flyin'."

The
Fokkers were coming up close on their tail, hovering like flies in
the clear, early morning sky. All too soon, they were near enough for
Drake to make out their markings. The sight of one striped aeroplane
in particular made his blood run cold.

"Keep your head, kid," Logan shouted, swerving the
Morane back and forth, making it more difficult of the Fokkers to aim
at them. "If you let the stories get to you, you're giving him
the advantage. Focus on firing. If you can bring a few of them down,
we might actually stand a chance of getting out of this in one
piece!"

"AAHHHH!" Drake shrieked despite himself as a
bullet ricocheted off the Morane's wind-shield, leaving a spiderweb
of fine cracks in the thick Triplex. Grabbing firm hold of his gun,
he poured all his terror and adrenaline into
firing----

Susanta Panda:
This is a good novel.It has been created in a manner that one can read it in a strech.The story flow like water.The suspance always buildup.What can happen next.Thanks to the writer of this book.

doomedoug:
been following your work a long time, shortly after your second story went up on fiction press. i dont normally do re-reads of stuff. yours is a rare exception, more so as i like the hole world set.

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